


Through Her Eyes

by AuthorinExile



Series: In Her Mind [1]
Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: And Everything That Implies, Character Death, Dovahzul, Dragonborn Makes Questionable Choices, Dragonborn is a Dragon in a Mortal Body, Dragons, Dragons Hoard Stuff, Even Dovahkinne, Existential Angst, Existential Crisis, Gen, Implied Relationships, Implied Sexual Content, Implied Tragic Backstory, Internal Conflict, Internal Monologue, Not an Original Character, Short Chapters, Unnamed Dovahkiin | Dragonborn, Updates Sporadically, strong female character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-01-22 21:23:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 4,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12491148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AuthorinExile/pseuds/AuthorinExile
Summary: The story of the Last Dragonborn has been told and retold until it has become legend.But people forget that she was a woman before she was a hero. People forget, or choose to ignore, that their hero was as caged by her circumstances as they were.Through her eyes, being Dovahkiin is no blessing.~~~The Dragonborn's introduction to the land of Skyrim told from her perspective and thoroughly lacking in glory.





	1. Helgen

She woke slowly, blearily, and blinked against the harsh light bouncing off the snow. Though she had been in Skyrim long enough to learn that such reflections were normal, she was by no means accustomed to them.

  
A dip in the road jostled her, and she became suddenly aware of the pulsing pain in her head. A strangled gasp and a grimace were all she could bear--talking was such a burden when injured--but it was enough to grab the Nord’s attention.

  
“Hey, you, you’re finally awake.”

  
_Obviously._ She resisted the urge to roll her eyes, but it was a considerable force of will.

  
The men in front of her took up conversation readily and easily excluded not only her but the bound man to her right. She did not much care for the particular topic they seemed determined to discuss--death, after all, was fun for no one--and accepted this exclusion with grace. She instead turned her attention to mentally cataloging her various bumps and bruises.

  
So dedicated was she to this task that she barely registered the change in her surroundings. Had it not been for the Nord in front of her and his eerily cheerful view of death, she might have sat there until the World Eater himself arrived.

  
(Later, she would remember having that thought, and she would laugh and cry and lose herself in a wave of thought and emotion so overwhelming that only strong drink and long sleep would pull her from it. But that would be much later.)

  
The next few minutes seemed like a dream, or a nightmare, and she moved through them with a calm sense of detachment. It was not until the dragon appeared, Shouting her would-be executioner down and knocking her on her ass, that she would recognize the world around her.

  
(Later, she would think that, maybe, it was not recognition, but _discovery_ , and she would almost--almost--be grateful. But that would be much, much later.)


	2. Men

She had run from fire, jumped from one collapsing building to another, taken cover beneath the wing of the very beast endangering her, and dodged attacks on all sides in the span of mere minutes.

She had done this all while still bound.

Now, she was watching what was almost certainly the most ill-timed pissing contest that she had ever witnessed. A dragon could shriek overhead--was, in fact, doing so--and there would still be time to argue, apparently.

_Men._

But now she had a choice to make. Apparently, she was the deciding force in this battle of wills. For all their talk, it always seemed to be women that handled the affairs of men, in the end.

Of course, though she might try to make light of the situation, this was not a light matter, and she was eventually forced to accept the reality that she, inexplicably, insanely, found herself trapped in.

One of these men had helped those that captured her, beat her, and left her unconscious for an indeterminate amount of time with no medical care. The other would happily fight the entire Empire barehanded because one man told him that it was the right choice.

One had delivered her into the arms of people who would have executed her with no recorded crime, no trial, and with only a weak apology as an excuse. The other was a proud member of a group renowned for its hate and intolerance as much as it was known for its--somewhat misguided, it must be said--battle against impossible odds for goals that she was almost certain this Ralof fellow could not list if under duress.

"The freedom of Skyrim" was a perfect banner in that very way. The locals would happily fight for something so clearly patriotic, and the winning governing system could enact an insanely broad range of policies under the facade of maintaining their goal. An unquestionably worrying strategy, certainly, but one she recognized as effective.

Of course, she assumed that the Imperial fellow--Hadvar, was it?--would almost definitely try to imprison her when this was all done with. However, she wasn’t willing to bet that she’d live to see the inside of a cell.

The Stormcloak might try to kill her, but he was as beaten as she was and definitely as tired. No Empire would back him, and he might even be willing to let her leave freely, provided she refrained from reporting him or making a nuisance of herself.

These were things that would only affect her once they were free, she knew. Nothing she knew about these men would matter if she died. She was focused far too much on something so tedious.

Trees and forests, and all that.

Well, at least one of them seemed strong enough to actually provide assistance in this nightmare of a situation. And that's what really mattered, she supposed.

Her choice was not a light one, but it suddenly seemed much clearer.

(And if she was helped through the doors of the aged keep by the sudden reappearance of a fire-breathing nightmare, that was purely her business.)


	3. The Keep

A handful of men were now dead by her hands. If she was not a criminal before the dragon came, then she certainly was one now. So she believed, and she wasn’t exactly fighting to argue the point with anyone else.

Her borrowed armor was loose and uncomfortable. Her weapon was heavy, awkward, and unwieldy. Yet, she had fought and won and survived.

She _lived_ , despite it all.

Immediately after a battle was not exactly an appropriate time to contemplate the vagaries of life and death. Experience she may be lacking, but common sense was readily available to her. And yet, something made her pause, just for a moment, and take stock of her situation.

She certainly felt...more alert, somehow, as though she were only now experiencing the copper tang of blood, the salt of sweat, and the tensing of exhausted muscles. Vaguely, she wondered if this were some sort of battle rush, such as old men often speak with equal parts venom and admiration in their voices. She hoped, quietly, privately, that she was just a fast learner and that she was adapting rapidly to such immediate change.

(Whatever the case, she resolutely squashed the budding sense of pride filling her and tried to feel appropriately mournful over the sudden loss of life.

She failed quite miserably.)

Her idle musings were abruptly cut short when a group of young soldiers was flattened in front of her.

Her companion tried, quite admirably, to convince the pair of them that the men were simply trapped on the other side and might yet find a way out of the burning, crumbling city. Unfortunately, she had been far enough down the hall to feel the warmth of blood splatter across her cheek. She knew better, though she would allow the Nord what comfort he might salvage.

(She believed, for a time, that the horrendous sound of three tons of stone landing on a person would be the worst thing that she would ever experience. She truly thought that the awful, grinding pop that she had been _so close_ to would haunt her nightmares forever and be the worst part of a fairly average life.

She was, eventually, proven wrong, but it would become a mental landmark signifying the end of her personal life--of her, as she knew herself--and the beginning of a persona that was largely a mask.)

The hours after that were a blur of senseless fighting and desperate scavenging. Looting corpses and slitting violent throats was not exactly how she imagined life in Skyrim, much less her first few days in the country, but she would learn.

She would have to.

(And if she stopped fighting herself along the way, if she accepted that blossoming sense of pride in her skill and let her talent in death-dealing become one more barrier between herself and the outside world, then that was hardly anyone else’s business.)


	4. Freedom

Running for your life, she learned, was an utter _burden_ while injured.

Of course, this may have been in part the fault of the sheer weight of the various objects which she had, bafflingly, decided she needed to take with her. Using an unfamiliar weapon certainly did not help matters, but she was not in a position that allowed her to be particularly picky.

Life or death situations were, annoyingly, like that.

The man she had escaped with had given her directions to the nearest town, offered some vague promise of aid, and promptly abandoned her to the wilds.

_Fuck_ that guy.

He probably expected her to follow at his heels, like a lost lap dog, but she had finally had enough of that sort of thing, especially from condescending men. She had just outrun a dragon; what need did she have of a Big, Strong Man--or anyone, for that matter--to protect her?

(For one beautiful, terrible moment, she remembered smiling eyes in a kind face, a grin that only ever bore love, and nights spent camping with a group of travelers not so different from herself as they tried to cross a closed border in secret. But the memories were bittersweet and painful, so she waved them away.)

No, what she needed was a hot meal and a relatively soft place to set her weary head. She could manage that well enough on her own, so she did.

The next morning found her stumbling into Riverwood anyway, searching for a suit of armor that might actually fit and a place to sell the random assortment of junk and garbage that she had collected. If she turned up looking for help too, well…

It had, after all, been offered.


	5. Up the Mountain: The Claw

The dragon had driven her mad. That was the only explanation. Why else would she have agreed to scale a mountain, enter a dangerously ancient barrow, and retrieve some stupid trinket?

  
( _Gold_ , a part of her mind whispered. _Gold and treasure and mine, all mine._ But she ignored it, for her own mental health.)

  
Well, she had given her word, so she would follow through on it, but she would certainly consult a physician after this.

  
Camilla’s Bosmer suitor, Faendal, walked beside her at an easy clip. He’d seemed almost _too_ eager to offer his assistance. When she’d offered to let him tag along, she’d been genuinely worried that he might die of sheer excitement. One of those “seek my fortune” types, she supposed.

  
She had thought that, after witnessing a bit of death firsthand, his excitement would fade.

  
She had been horribly mistaken.

  
If anything, Faendal seemed _more_ eager. That was worrying. Of course, if she’d been trapped in that tiny town for ages with nothing more exciting to do than chop wood, she might crave blood, too.

  
(And there it was, again. Thoughts like that had become disturbingly frequent. She had never been extraordinarily violent, as a rule. But something had changed, deep in her mind.

  
_Maybe it’s the sudden influx of violence in my life_ , she thought, running a bandit through on the end of her weapon.

  
Ultimately, it didn’t matter. Not when she was fighting for her life, at least.)

  
In any case, Faendal’s thirst for blood proved useful. His arrows were expertly aimed, and he had saved her from a perilous situation more than once. A useful companion, to be sure. She would have to convince him to accompany her to Whiterun.

  
The bandits within Bleak Falls mentioned the trinket she and Faendal were after before her arrows bloomed from their throats.

  
It was not much of a lead, but at least she was on the right path.


	6. Up the Mountain: Draugr

She had to hand it to the ancient Nords. They had this corpse preservation stuff down to a _science._

  
The grotesque things crawled from their graves stiffly, like old men preparing for a new day. Unlike the elderly, once they were up it proved to be a real challenge to get them back down. They were significantly more dangerous than her grandfather, that was certain.

  
Apparently, the ancient Nords were also masters of weaponsmithing. She would be more impressed by that fact if she hadn’t started gushing blood from a single, well-aimed swing of an axe. Faendal was there to finish the beast off with a well-placed arrow and hand her a potion from her fallen pack, but she shuddered to think of what might have happened if he had been in Riverwood, instead.

  
_Irrelevant_ , she decided, and wrapped what remained of her wound with linen.

  
Hopefully, these draugr were not drawn to the smell of a fresh wound the way the zombies of Cyrodiil had been. That memory provoked a shudder.

  
“Are you alright?”

  
Ah, Faendal, bless you, darling. Ever the helpful one.

  
“I will be. Let’s move on.”

  
Naturally, just as she learned the many tricks of the draugr and memorized how to most efficiently dispatch them, she found the puzzle door. The foul creature awaiting her there tested every maneuver she had ever learned and even a few she had invented.

  
Skyrim was quickly proving to be a province full of surprises, but not all of them were pleasant.

  
Well. It would keep her on her toes, at least.


	7. Up the Mountain: The Wall and the Stone

_Here lies the guardian, keeper of_...something, something, something.

  
It was largely indecipherable after a certain point, and attempting to stare longer only succeeded in giving her the sort of migraine that made one wish for death.

  
Well, it was a fool’s endeavor anyway. Trying to decipher the infamous Word Walls… What rubbish. Everyone knew that whatever ancient language they had been carved in--and there were many theories about what it might have been, oh yes--had been lost for centuries. It was a waste of time and effort to attempt any sort of decoding.

  
(But some part of her _knew_ and some part of her was _furious_ that she was unable to grasp such a basic thing as reading. Though she knew it was more likely that she was simply imagining such a thing, for a moment it seemed like she almost really did know what the wall said, and the sudden loss of those words felt like a deeply tragic, personal thing, though she might not have been able to decide why.)

  
She turned her attention away from the useless wall and instead focused on the prone form of the draugr they had slain. Huge and hulking even in death, easily as large as any modern Nordic man, the creature now seemed small and somehow fragile without that eerie blue glow behind his eyes. He had been a tough foe--harder to defeat than his brethren in the rest of the barrow, certainly--but, as her father was fond of saying, everything dies if you hit it hard enough.

  
The greatsword she took, or, rather, had Faendal take. It was a bit on the heavy side for her, but Faendal could carry it on his back and help her find a use for the thing.  
The poisons and potions that had not expired or been damaged she packed into her bag. If they were of no use to her, she could certainly find someone willing to buy them.  
She took everything that might be of even the slightest value from the chest, only to pause over a decorated stone nearly as wide as her forearm was long.

  
Frankly, she was afraid of touching the thing. Something so old might be damaged where she can’t see, and it looked important. She might not have any great and earnest love for the barrows or the disturbingly fresh draugr, but she would not wish the destruction of history on any people. There had been enough of that sort of thing in the last war, and that was disregarding the amount of knowledge lost or destroyed in previous conflicts.

The Nords were proud of their heritage, and rightfully so, she felt. Though there were dark spots, as with any group, it was a long and colorful tale that created the modern people of Skyrim. If this tablet happened to be some relic of long passed days or forgotten knowledge...

  
To even think of damaging what was certainly an ancient and valuable artifact--or, worse, to sell it for mere gold in the market of some small trading village--sent shivers up her spine.

  
No. Best to leave it where it was and report its existence to someone who knows what they’re doing. She'd heard good things about the College of Winterhold. Surely, once this business with the Jarl was over, she could make the trip.

  
She closed the chest up, and followed Faendal up the stairs that led to the not-so-hidden exit.


	8. The Gate

She was unable to convince Faendal to accompany her to the city.

Apparently, he was fond of Riverwood, somehow, and he was afraid Camilla would get the wrong impression if he traipsed all over Skyrim with another woman.

She had nearly laughed in his face at that one. Where were his thoughts of Camilla when he was sharing her bedroll or pulling her into his bed at night? Surely, Camilla could only get the right impression, if he meant what she thought.

But she let him go. It was, after all, his choice, and she would not travel with a companion that disliked her. Such a thing made the road infinitely more challenging to become accustomed to.

In fact, she counted Faendal’s absence as a blessing. She learned how to compensate for the lack of a companion in combat more easily than she thought she might, and, with no one else to worry about, she was free to do all that she desired. Without a voice yelling, “No,” she was able to follow all the whispers that said, “Maybe just once.”

Such was how she found herself at Whiterun’s gates in the company of The Companions as they chatted amiably about her skill in combat and their defeat of a giant.

Her “skill in combat” consisted almost entirely of shooting an arrow into the giant’s shoulder and of slicing open the creature’s calf so that it fell within killing range. But if they thought it merited boasting, she was more than happy to let them have their fun.

She was stopped at the gate by a guard in armor that was clearly not made for him. He looked like a child wearing his father’s chainmail, and perhaps he singled her out because he knew that she knew that fact. The woman with the bow and the impossible-to-pronounce name claimed her, telling the guard that she was with The Companions. A lovely thought, truly, but it did not help.

But when she spoke up, in a firm voice she had not needed to use since soldiers asked for her name in the ruin that was once a city far to the south, they all quieted.

“I come from Helgen. I have news of a dragon.”

_That_ got them out of her way.


	9. The Jarl of Whiterun

Balgruuf was not the sort of fat and lazy child that she associated with the ruling class. He was, to her surprise, a generally warm man with a kind smile, weary eyes, and a striking resemblance to that Ralof fellow, actually. 

Balgruuf accepted her news graciously and managed to form a plan rather quickly and calmly, given the situation.

If she were not as attentive as she had recently come to be, she might have dismissed the tired slope of his shoulders, the faint sigh as he moved, the creaking as he stood that could not be wholly attributed to his ancient throne.

But she _was_ that attentive, so she heard it all, and stored it away for a date that it might be useful.

  
(She did not know when that day would be, or if it even _would_ be, but she had learned quickly that it was better to be prepared in this harsh land.)

  
Balgruuf seemed a kind man, but appearances were ever deceiving.


	10. The Wizard

“Farengar,” he said when he introduced himself.

  
Well, it certainly fit a wizard, she thought, and it certainly sounded standoffish enough to suit _this_ particular wizard.

  
He wanted a stone.

  
“The Dragonstone,” he said. “It should be in a barrow not far from here. Bl--”

  
“Bleak Falls Barrow,” she finished, and sighed at his look of genuine surprise.

  
“I… Yes. How did you know that?”

  
Well, her migraine was worse than ever before. Gods above and demons sideways, but she could be a right moron some days.

  
“Lucky guess,” she managed to sigh. “Is it about yea big, yea wide, with a rough map and the figure of a dragon scored at the top?”

  
Farengar goggled at her and her vague yet accurate descriptions of something that he no doubt considered a priceless artifact. “...I think so.”

  
She sighed. Goodness, but this adventuring thing was not what it was advertised to be. Lots of running every which way.

  
_When this is over_ , she told herself for the thousandth time, _you’ll be free to do as you like. Build a house, explore, farm. Anything but run errands for needy Jarls._

  
“Fine,” she grumbled at the wizard, “Give me a day or two. You’ll have your rock.”

  
“The Dragonstone is more than a--”

  
His fury was cut short by the doors of the keep closing behind her.

  
_Just think_ , she chanted in her mind, _Just think about how much nothing you can do after all this. Buy a house, settle down, avoid the war. Just think._

  
(This thought would be one of many that would plague her for an indefinite amount of time.

  
_Just think_ , she would hum to herself in bitter tones. _Just think about your life when this is all said and done._

  
Eventually, she would reach a day when she could picture no life after all was said and done, and she would mourn a future that she had never really had in the first place.)


	11. The Visitor

She was chilled to the bone, hungry, and far too frustrated to even be properly mad.

She was paused just outside of Farengar’s study, staring at the hooded woman leaning over the wizard’s desk.

  
The woman was short and plump in the way that all women seemed to be after a certain age. Vaguely yellowish strands of hair fell from the hood and further concealed the woman’s face.

  
Yet there was undoubtedly something familiar about Farengar's visitor. If only she could place it…

  
Then the duo noticed her lurking outside the door, and the mystery woman gathered her things in order to make a hasty retreat.

  
As the shrouded figure passed, the scent of freshly cut pine wafted off of her, interwoven with the familiar, acrid smell that brewing potions created.

  
_That_ was a familiar combination of scents.

  
Riverwood was the only town she’d been to that _always_ smelled of pine. It was one of the few things that gave her any sort of affection for the town--fresh pine sap was, after all, arguably the best thing one could experience after spending several hours smelling nothing but the charring of human flesh. It had been _such_ a relief after the nightmare that was Helgen.

  
Spending her nights at the Riverwood Inn had also given her an appreciation for the bizarrely therapeutic smell of bubbling potions and steeping poisons. It was also the only place within reasonable distance that combined those two comforting scents into one that she would bottle and sell if she could.

  
After speaking with Farengar, she had a stop to make.


	12. The Dragon

Surviving an attack had, unfortunately, put her ahead of everyone else in the Dealing with Dragons column of work experience.

  
Clearly, running like mad from a beast ripped from her wildest nightmares had made her qualified to fight an entirely different dragon in moderately open space with only a handful of poorly armed, poorly armored, underpaid city guards for reinforcements.

  
Clearly.

  
She had not been this angry with a system of government since the Imperials had tried to execute her without due process.

  
What was it with ruling bodies trying to kill her?

  
Well, she’d have to ask Balgruuf later. She had far more important things to do, like figure out what she _would_ do when the dragon realized that those arrows were coming from behind a pillar and decided to topple it onto her.

  
By the Aedra, when she was done here, she was retiring on a snowy mountainside somewhere and leaving the world to rot.

  
Adventuring was for idiots.


	13. The Shout

She kneeled by the dragon’s head, and discreetly wiped her cheeks.

  
She was mourning, and she didn’t know why.

  
Here was a beast that had devoured men, scorched the earth, and tried his damndest to destroy the cornerstone of a safe civilization. And she was _sobbing_ over his corpse.

  
The tears had not even formed until he had fallen, and now she could not stop them.

  
“Oh, it will be ok, miss. We saved some of the men, and we can rebuild the tower.”

  
She nodded and forced herself to stop weeping.

  
_Let him think me a weakling woman incapable of control_ , she thought. _Better than to be caught mourning an enemy._

  
As she stood, allowing a fresh wave of exhaustion to wash over her, she was struck by a rush of thought and emotion that crashed into her with all the force of a runaway war horse.

  
_She was flying and hunting and locked in a downward spiral with another dovah who had sunk his teeth into her exposed neck. She--_

  
Bright lights, healing magic, a frenzied cry.

  
_\--was diving into icy water, Speaking with another dovah thrice her size, issuing the commands of the Firstborn. She--_

  
A blanket, warmth, trying to hold her still.

  
_She--_

  
She jumped to her feet with a strangled cry--( _a roar, it was a roar, she was roaring and growling behind useless, garbage, blunt teeth_ )--and broke a guard’s nose.

  
“What did you do to me!?”

  
But they had no answer. They only stared at the dry bones of a dragon that had died far too recently to look as he did now before directing their gaze to her.

  
“Dragonborn,” one of them whispered.

  
As she readied her weapon in fury, ready for answers if she had to _take_ them, a warmth bubbled in her throat, and the power of _Fus_ knocked the guard on his back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hope the "fading in and out of consciousness" thing came across. I wrote most of this chapter before I knew what event I was writing about, and then I couldn't bring myself to change the parts that I was worried about. 
> 
> So. 
> 
> There's that.


	14. The Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uploading this early for the handful of people who enjoy it. Season of giving, and all that.

She had run from the guards as soon as they started to argue the finer points of the marvelous gift of the Dragons’ Blood.

  
Faintly, she had heard some remark about not being a Nord and not understanding, and the absurdity of it had brought her to her knees, rolling with laughter.

  
No, the Dunmer with a lifetime of travel and servitude under a Nord could never understand, but she--Cyrodiil born and bred, with the most notable member of her family being centuries in the grave-- _she_ was certainly worthy of the title.

  
She had collapsed and laughed until tears ran down her cheeks and her cries had morphed into something a bit more delirious and a lot less like laughter.

  
And just as she stood, a scream, a _Shout_ , echoed through the valley and shook her to her bones, shook her to the ground, made her collapse all over again and scream; though she did not hear herself over the rattling of her teeth and the clanging of her armor, which shook like a small child because _she_ was shaking like a small child.

 

~~~~~~

  
The sun rose hours later over a small city, panicking for the mysterious loss of a fabled hero they had only just discovered, and a frail woman, curled over her pack and lamenting the injustice of it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Full disclosure, I only started this at the beginning of the game in order to show the Dragonborn's initial reactions to the world around her. I always intended to move on to snapshots of this quest or this character or any other separate thing. 
> 
> This was always supposed to be a collection of individual reactions, but then it ran away from me, and by the time I caught it, it had gone and written itself an ending.
> 
> So this is it. The end of the beginning.
> 
> I might turn this into a series and use this original work as background for a work of individual reactions, but I promise nothing.


End file.
